Remote Pod Life

I was going to post about something different today, but nanoparticles will just have to wait. Because this week saw the introduction of habitation and science pods worthy of my best childhood space travel dreams. Not only that, the pods are opening for service on a thoroughly inhospitable surface right here on our own planet: Antarctica. A team of researchers and conservationists recently returned a bottle of whisky to an Antarctic base abandoned almost a century ago – the original team had left provisions behind in their attempts to complete their mission alive. Anything built for human shelter in the Antarctic tends to get covered by snow. Also, if the ice upon which the structure is built is moving, the structure will move along with the ice – not necessarily in one piece. Also, much like our space junk left on the lunar surface, whatever gets left behind in Antarctic won’t decompose in the same manner it might elsewhere on the planet. Ideally, whatever gets taken in should be taken back out.

The newest British Antarctic Survey (BAS) station is designed to try and meet some of these challenges in a more long-lasting manner than many older bases. The Halley VI was opened this week. A modular construction, it is perched on legs to protect it against snow, but more importantly, it is built to move. Ski constructions at the end of the legs mean the entire base can be towed from location to location as necessary, or driven out of deepening snow. For comparison, here’s one old base, Halley III, in its current location:

Halley IIIBuilt in the 1970s, it was abandoned to the elements in the 1980s.Image: BAS

As I said recently, research being carried out at the South Pole is of a basic nature, i.e. it’s not for commercial purposes but rather to explore the fundamentals of how the world works for the betterment of human knowledge. That’s not to say that the line of inquiry can’t result in projects, discoveries and advances which can be utilized for other purposes. Sometimes it’s not just the research results themselves, but the needs-driven innovations that underpin the ability of the scientists to do their work.

So, in confronting the challenges of housing a research team in the Antarctic, the design team at Hugh Broughton Architects might have provided us with new insights into building a greener shelter as well – one that is a “visitor, not a resident” on the land, according to the architect, and certainly one with excellent insulation.

At any rate, when I next picture myself lounging on a far flung moon, or maybe just lounging on a newly formed but remote shore on Earth as a retiree, it might just look like this: